Friday 10th August

Faanui Bay,
Bora Bora.

16 29.425 S
151 45.672 W

The dawn occurred during my watch and after it began to get light Abigail appeared followed by Gerry. We were soon passing the second island – just leaving us just 25 miles to go before we reached the anchorage at Bora Bora. Having caught nothing yesterday Abigail was keen to put the fishing line back in the water today – not that we caught anything today either but we tried! The wind also dropped away to nothing so we gave in and dropped the main, switched the engine on and motored for the rest of the trip.
By 11.00 hrs we were entering the anchorage at Bora Bora yacht club. I say anchorage but very few boats can actually anchor here as the water is over 80 feet deep and most of us don’t carry enough chain to anchor safely. Luckily the yacht club has a few mooring buoys and we were lucky enough to grab the second to last available one and tie ourselves on to it. The very last one went as we were tying up; if we had arrived any later we would have been out of luck and had to motor to a different bay to anchor. Once we were safely moored Gerry and Abigail jumped in the water for a swim, I held back as their squeals told me that the water was freezing cold, they didn’t stay in the water long and once they got out we put the dinghy into the water and attached the outboard. Gerry took off into the yacht club dock to find out about paying for the mooring and checking in with the gendarmerie. He was soon back telling us that we were booked in for dinner at 18.30 hrs and that happy hour began at 17.00hrs. The checking in was at a different dock so he then took off to investigate that. Meanwhile Abigail had a nap and I tided up the cockpit mess from the trip. Gerry returned and suggested that we all go ashore into town; we locked everything up, gathered up our gear and headed off in the dinghy for the town dock - quite a distance away, where we tied up and proceeded to walk into the town. As it was nearly 15.30hrs by now most places were closed or closing, Abigail and I had a quick look at the pearl shops whilst Gerry had a beer with John who he had bumped into outside a bakery. After that we decided that we needed to go back and have a rest before happy hour, when we returned to the dinghy Gerry was certain that someone had syphoned some of the fuel out of our outboard tank as it seemed a lot less than he expected, still there was enough to get us back to the boat so it was OK. Although the plan was for a nap none of us slept, Gerry hooked up the internet and we found out that there had been a plane crash off of Moorea – this presumably was what the mayday calls had been about as we were under way to here, we didn’t know of anyone who was flying out at that time so we assume that we didn’t know anyone onboard the flight. When it was time to go ashore for happy hour we climbed back in the dink and roared into the yacht club dock. As we tied up we saw that there were about 5 other dinghies following behind us – the news of happy hour was well spread! The yacht club as such is a bit of a non event, it really doesn’t operate as a club which is a shame but there is a restaurant next to it with a loose affiliation. The restaurant is a tiki hut which opens onto the water front, it is very well done with white sand as a floor covering and white billowing curtains tied back at the entrances (the sand is a pain as it gets in your shoes though). We drank a few cocktails, with Abigail giving the barman instructions on how to make her favourite one, and then it was time for dinner. The bar had been full for happy hour and we were quite disappointed to find that the restaurant wasn’t quite so well supported by the visiting yachties. The food was good and we enjoyed the meal before climbing back into our dinghy and heading back to the boat for the night. We were all very tired and soon in bed sleeping soundly.